Devices and Desires
by Alexandra Spar
Summary: It's been done. The Nightbird returns.
1. Default Chapter

Disclaimer: Transformers belongs to Hasbro. I no own. I borrow. I give back when done.            

_It's easier, in the dark. Easier to forget where I am, and who I am; easier to remember where I should be, alone again in a different darkness. _

_            But there is always something there to remind me; the increased gravity, wearisome for beings like myself designed and built on a world of a different scale; the occasional dart and gleam of organic creatures in the black ocean beyond the window. My body is not what it used to be, either; the clumsy forms this world has forced on us are necessary, if regrettable. And as much as I would wish it otherwise, this primitive little planet has changed me, too; changed the way I think. Perhaps the four million years of deactivation under that volcano had an effect on my personality core. _

_            Because the soldier I was, back on Cybertron, would not have these dreams... _

_It's always the same. The baking heat of the canyons, and the urgency of finding it..finding her...and the thing she carries; by the time we get there the Autobots have gathered around their quarry. She lies still beneath the glowing net, and the irritation I feel is for a useful weapon—a device, nothing more—taken from me. The World Energy Chip is of paramount importance, of course, and that is why I have come after her. My beam disperses the bonds the Autobots have put on her, and she is free. I can feel the victory, now, as I have felt it before, so many times, just within my grasp. _

_            And this time it's Starscream, not the Autobots, who snatches it away. The old anger rises up in me like a power-surge; fury not only at his continued disobedience but also for the consequences of this particular act of insubordination. He lost the World Energy Chip and its bearer for me in one null-ray blast. The illogic of this makes me wonder at his mental stability, not for the first time. _

_            I made my displeasure abundantly clear to him when he was brought back to the base, of course. The memory of that particular encounter almost makes up for the inconvenience he caused me. Almost. _

_            But the dream comes back, night after night. I have tried setting the recharge cycles deeper, tried cache-file clearances, even tried consuming massive amounts of energon, which works briefly but causes disorientation and surges when it wears off, and still the dream comes back. The look in those tilted yellow optics beneath the glowing energy net, as I raised my antimatter blaster; the way her body draped helplessly over Prime's arm as she collapsed... _

_            Yes, my anger was at the loss of a useful tool. At the time, I was merely furious that victory had been torn from me just as my fists closed on it; only afterward did I begin to consider that perhaps I was angry for another reason, as well. _

_            I cannot get her out of my mind, and it is both tiresome and counterproductive, but I am unable to forget her. To forget Nightbird. She had no true mind, no true self; she was innately inferior, a thing of human construction and conceit. But I remember the look in those optics, and I wonder if perhaps Bombshell and Soundwave had achieved more than they intended, when they reprogrammed her to my orders. Is it possible for a sparkless shell—for a drone—to come alive? To be conscious of itself? _

_            The soldier I was before would not have thoughts like these. Would not have wondered if it were possible to steal her back from the human scientist, and to give her true sentience of her own, as I gave my Constructicons sentience with the power of Vector Sigma. It is Earth that has done this to me. Earth. _

_            One of them said it once. A human religious leader of some sort, fleeing from me in a city; I can remember picking him up, wondering about his strange black robes, the sigil he bore on a chain around his neck. "This is our fault," he had blurted out, his fear sour and sharp to my olfactory sensors; "this is our fault, your coming is the sign of our failures...we have followed too much the devices and desires of our own hearts, and we have not done as we should; you are a punishment." _

_            I flung him away, and he crumpled to the ground and said no more; but the words remained in my mind with the perfect clarity of digital recall. Devices and desires. _

_            This planet has made me desire things which I should never have come to need. _

_            In the darkness of the ocean outside the window, things move and glow eerily with lights they use to lure unsuspecting prey to their doom. I have to wonder slightly if the creatures drawn to these bright lures find the light irresistible even as they are being eaten alive by its bearer. _

_            I have to wonder if I can stand my loneliness. _

            I stalked into the command room, later than I had intended, trying to shake off the most recent of the dreams; it had been worse than usual, and I had woken from recharge with a dull kind of pain in my chest, as though my oxygen-intake filters were malfunctioning. I'd ignored it, of course. I'm not like Starscream, not one to harp on every little ache and pain. 

            Soundwave was already there, as I had expected. He sat behind the main command console, tabulating scan results and the reports of the morning scout patrol.              "What news?" I demanded. 

            "The Black River power plant is online and generating, mighty Megatron," he reported, tonelessly. I always find it difficult to decide whether that processed voice holds a mocking note; like my lieutenant on Cybertron, he has no real facial features to speak of, and it is sometimes challenging to read his intent. Again, I found myself cursing the limitations of these Earthly forms, and what they've done to my abilities to analyze my subordinates. "1,685 megawatt capacity." 

            "Excellent," I said, folding my arms. "What's the security like?" 

            "Not worried about the squishies' security forces, are we, great leader?" inquired Starscream from the doorway. I turned and fixed him with my best _shut up, right now, and maybe I'll let you keep your wings_ glare. 

            "Hardly worried, Starscream," I told him. "However, a wise leader always takes care to assess a situation before throwing himself into it. Advice from which you might benefit, my impetuous friend." 

            He ignored me, as he often does, coming forward and draping himself on the back of Soundwave's chair. "Interesting. Two reactor units, both boiling water reactors; two main turbines. Should be easy enough to take over." 

            "Starscream," I said, warningly, "allow me to remind you that the humans are at a much higher alert level than before, after that charming little terrorist attack on their city. It will not be as easy as you think to commandeer Black River." 

            "You're going soft," he told me, red optics flaring. "The leader you used to be would've already taken over both units and been halfway home to Cybertron by now." He paused, still leaning indolently on the back of the command chair, and then that derisive little smile curved the corners of his mouth. "In fact, you've been acting strangely for quite some time now, Megatron. You're losing control, _Lea_der. You're getting old." 

            My dreams flickered again in my short-term memory, the pallid—almost desperate—glow of a pair of yellow optics, Starscream's mocking laughter, the deadly draining pain of my growing knowledge: I am not what I have been, I am losing control, I am losing touch....I am failing....the images, the memories surged again suddenly like a cascade failure in my circuits, and my fist closed around Starscream's throat with a most satisfactory crunch of bending metal. I lifted the Seeker easily, my fusion cannon's barrel staring him in the face. 

            Starscream's hands clawed ineffectively at my forearm as I closed my fist, enjoying the mild electric shocks as circuits gave way under my crushing grip, relishing the surprised agony on his face. "Getting old?" I repeated. "Losing control?" 

            He tried to speak, but I was squeezing a little too tight, and after a moment more his hands fell away from my arm and he sagged in my grasp. I flung him to the floor, where he lay moaning weakly, and bent over Soundwave's chair. The communications officer hadn't moved an inch during the whole drama. 

            "We attack at dawn," I said, simply. 

** 

            This wasn't good. Not good at all. Doctor Fujiyama had just contacted the Autobots and their leader to discuss an important matter. Normally, the sort of calls they got on Teletran One were to either call them for help or to thank them for services rendered; this looked like something else entirely. Prime couldn't help but notice how pale the man looked when his face first appeared on Teletran One's screen. 

            "I wish I could say that I have contacted you during good times, Mr. Optimus Prime," said Fujiyama, his stilted English more awkward than ever with the force of his emotion.  "However, I am afraid that something horrible has happened." 

            "What is it, Doctor?" Prime asked, arms folded. Fujiyama swallowed hard. 

            "I am afraid that the Nightbird has escaped." 

            There were a few groans and soft gasps from some of the younger Autobots. 

"But how? We returned her to the lab and saw her safely deactivated!" Ratchet exclaimed.  

            Optimus glanced down at the medic. Fujiyama was talking again, waving his hands. 

            "Well, you see, Nightbird is still a very valuable and powerful weapon to contain to say the very least. However I don't think that someone has taken her like previously. On the contrary I think she left on her own."

            Optimus was silent for a moment, working out the intricacies of that last sentence. "But she's just a robot," he said, "she isn't sentient, right, Doctor?" 

            Fujiyama nodded emphatically. "That is what she was, certainly; however, I think lately she has in fact been experiencing her own thoughts and emotions. I didn't even think such a thing was possible." 

            "Well, how do you suppose it happened?" Jazz asked. "I mean, when we fought her, she was more of a tool than anything else." 

            Fujiyama sighed. Despite his respect for the Autobots he couldn't help noticing how biased against Nightbird they appeared; he had to assume they found her offensive on some level. 

            Out loud he said, "We do not know yet. I am beginning to wonder if Megatron might have tampered with her." It was, in fact, his only workable hypothesis. "Mr. Optimus Prime," he continued, "I am hoping that we can retrieve the Nightbird once again. She is very dangerous. And should not be on her own in her mental state."

            There was a murmur in the Autobot control room: the pronoun had sounded certain, this time. Nightbird was, apparently, a "she" now to her creator, not an "it."

            Optimus nodded. "I understand. The Autobots and I will do what we can to help. Thank you for contacting us." He leaned forward and cut the connection, frowning thoughtfully.  

            "Well, that figures. The humans make a mess of things and then they expect us to clean it all up," Jazz complained. 

            "Jazz," Optimus said, wearily, and he subsided. The Autobot leader turned to his troops. 

            "Well, looks like it's back to saving the day," said Bumblebee. Prowl nodded.

            "We can't let the Nightbird run around free. Who knows what kind of damages it could cause?"

            "Let's kick some skidplate," Ironhide put in. Prime was glad of the battlemask; it hid his smile. 

            "Very good," he said. "Autobots, transform and roll out." 

            It was a bright, shiny day, and there was little traffic; they were halfway to the laboratory when Prime got a call from headquarters. "Decepticon activity at Black River power plant. Assistance required." 

            "Well, I guess we'll have to put off getting Nightbird back," said Prime, as they changed course. "We can't let the Decepticons have that power plant." 

** 

_            ...subroutine x-k-19003 running _

_            ...identify identify... _

_            ...if unknown=enemy then action=attack _

_            ...unknown=unknown no threat _

_            ...action=evade _

            She slid behind a pillar of rock, mind whirling as she tried to process if-then statements given her sudden and total, wholesale vision of her surroundings. It had been less than half a twenty-four-hour time period since she had awakened, for the first time aware of her body and her being as opposed to simple binary equations explaining what she was and what she must do. In that time, she had found her strength more than equal to the bonds of the stasis cocoon in which she had found herself; it had crumpled beneath her fingers and torn open, and she had been free. 

_            free=alive. _

            Alive did not compute, but she had come to the conclusion that some things were better off uncomputed, merely accepted. She slid around the rock-pillar, wondering with half her mind whether it was safe to move out and with the other half who was fighting...and why. 

            There was a strange memory somewhere in her databanks that kept coming back: red optics, or eyes, or something analogous, in a face the white of the ceilings she'd stared at all the hours and days she had spent in the Lab. Red eyes, and a voice like thunder. She could not trace the memory file containing that scene, and therefore had been unable to delete it from herself. It came upon her unawares, from time to time. 

She peered round the pillar, and was pleasantly surprised to find that they seemed to have stopped discharging plasma rifles at one another. There was a little conversation, and then one side of the battle jerked, collapsed in on themselves, and became...land vehicles. They sped off towards the south. 

_            ...event=unlikely _

_            ...event=unknown _

_            ...unknown=no threat _

_            ...response=investigation _

** 

            I found myself a trifle disappointed in Optimus Prime. Clearly he had heard something about the Black River power plant and decided he'd show up to spoil my fun, but he didn't seem to have his heart in it the way he normally did; he seemed rather distracted, as a matter of fact, and it was only after I took off his yellow subordinate's arm with a fusion blast that he really paid any attention to me at all. 

            "There," I yelled, as the diminutive Transformer's arm bounced amusingly on the ground. "So will you all suffer who thwart the desires of Megatron!" 

            Prime jerked around and let fly with his blaster rifle, and it was pure bad luck that part of the electrical substation chose that moment to blow up and threw me off balance; I took the rifle blast directly through my shoulder with a shower of sparks and a startled yell. It hurt—hurt worse than I'd thought possible, actually, as my shoulder joint was crushed into razor-sharp shreds of metal, my mechfluid veins torn and pulsing with vital lubricant. I glanced around the battlefield as my optics sparked and flared in short-circuiting agony, and saw that most of my army was either hurt or outnumbered. 

            "Decepticons, retreat!" I yelled, clutching my ruined shoulder with my other hand. All around me my forces took to the air, swooping off into the brightening day, and it was only after they'd made aerial formation that I realized I couldn't lift off the ground. Luckily Prime and his lackeys had buggered off as soon as they saw we were leaving, and I was alone with the wrecked substation and a growing puddle of mechfluid expanding at my feet. 

            I knew they'd turn back for me; at least Soundwave would turn back, and he carried enough authority to force the others to obey. That knowledge didn't make it any easier, as I slumped to my knees, the strength draining out of me with the pumping mechfluid. Damn Prime, he'd hit an artery... 

            Someone was there, suddenly. I assumed it was Soundwave; it generally is, under these circumstances, although the arms holding me up seemed more slender than Soundwave's, and the fingers probing my wound were the wrong colour... 

I looked up into a pair of tilted almond-coloured optics, and then there was simply nothing else to think. 


	2. 2

            There are worse things to wake up to than a grinning Starscream, but at the moment I couldn't think of any. My vision stabilized, allowing me to determine that I was lying in the base's excuse for a medical bay, and my internal diagnostics told me that I was more or less repaired.

            Starscream's grin widened as he saw I was awake. "Welcome back, _Lea_der." He straightened up, folding his arms, as I sat up and tested my shoulder, gingerly, waiting for the pain. 

            "How long have I been out?" I snapped, refusing to acknowledge his obvious self-congratulation. The grin didn't waver.

            "Three days. The Constructicons said you'd be awake some time today." He was fairly vibrating with his desire to show me whatever it was he'd been up to while I had been subject to the Constructicons' tender mercies. I wasn't about to indulge him, which was becoming apparent. "Mighty Megatron, don't you want to know what's been happening during your recovery?"

            "Do I?" I swung my legs off the recharge couch and stood up, testing my equilibrium. Not bad. There was still some residual pain in the shoulder, and in my chest, but I dismissed this as unimportant. "I'm sure even _you_ couldn't have caused too much damage in just three days, Starscream."

            "You wound me, Leader," he said, that grin still stretching from audio to audio. "I've _only_ managed to recapture the Nightbird and hold it ransom for the Autobots' entire stock of energon cubes."

            There was a brief pause, as I reran that statement several times through my central processor; for a moment I saw flickering images of violet and grey, tilted optics bright against a sky darkening too quickly as my energy drained out; the familiar reflection of my own face superimposed on the darkness of the ocean beyond my viewport. 

            "You did what?" My voice was very, very calm.

            "I knew you'd be pleased, mighty Mega---_urk_..." He struggled as my fingers tightened once more about his throat. I do like that look on him; it suits him well. Grabbing him by the throat with my right hand has the added benefit of allowing him a nice view right up the barrel of my fusion cannon, which helps to get my point across.

            "You had the nerve to use _my_ forces to get us involved in a ridiculous hostage situation with the Autobots? Oh, well done, Starscream. Well done indeed. You deserve a commendation." I lifted the Seeker off the medical bay floor and cocked my arm back, calculating distance and velocity, and flung him hard enough against the wall that his left wingtip snapped off and bounced amusingly on the floor. He shrieked.

            "Where is the Nightbird?" I demanded, as he curled up in a heap of dented metal. "What have you done with her?"

            "...it's.....in the brig......under guard...." Starscream gasped, glaring at me with a delightful combination of fury and surprised hurt.

            "Get yourself fixed and go out on patrol, Starscream. I don't want to see you for at least a day. I've got enough to do trying to fix this little situation you've got us into."

***

            Optimus Prime paced the Ark's command room floor. Their failure to retrieve the Nightbird was, for him, not only a professional but also a personal failing; he had given Fujiyama his word, and he had not been able to follow through. 

            He took no satisfaction in the fact that they'd clearly hurt Megatron badly in the fight at Black River; Bumblebee had lost an arm, and both Ironhide and Jazz had taken nasty hits. Of course Ratchet had been able to repair them, but they should never have been hurt in the first place; it was his fault as leader, and he forced himself to remember that, over and over. _I must not fail again._

            He had been surprised when the communication came in from the Decepticon base demanding the Nightbird's ransom; that wasn't Megatron's style. Megatron would have used her for something, made the best of the situation by using her capabilities to win him something he would otherwise have been unable to capture; he wouldn't have done anything as dramatic and poorly conceived as holding the ninja robot for ransom. But, as Starscream—who had been the one to contact them—had said, the Autobots had no choice. Either they handed over the energon cubes and retrieved the Nightbird, or the Decepticons would unleash her on the world with orders to destroy all humans she came across.

            Part of Optimus Prime wanted to tell Starscream to go ahead and set her free—surely the combined forces of the Autobots would be enough to find and destroy Nightbird before she caused too much damage—but the intrinsic Optimus flinched at the thought of all the needless deaths she would doubtless achieve. Nightbird was a weapon, and the safety of humanity required her to be locked up and deactivated.

            That was where they came in. 

            He was waiting for Ratchet to give him the all-clear. Several other Autobots besides Bumblebee, Jazz and Ironhide had been injured in the fight at Black River, and Prime wasn't about to send his warriors into battle when they were still trying to heal. They were hanging back and biding their time. Optimus knew that retrieving the Nightbird from Megatron's underwater fortress would not be easy, or pleasant, but it was something he had to do. _I have a duty,_ he thought. _Those who can fight must protect those who have no defenses._

_            I have a duty._

***

            One of the first things I did when my ship crashed to the bottom of the wretched Pacific Ocean was to strengthen all the lower hulls. We were far enough down here for the pressure of the countless tons of water to pose a real danger to our hull's structural integrity; while my ship had been designed to withstand the beating of atmospheric reentry and the airless void of hard vacuum, the combination of pressure with corrosive salt water raised concerns about how long the ship itself could survive. So I had the hulls reinforced, to much grumbling from my crew; and while doing so, I had the brig on the lowest deck reinforced as well. Eight-inch-thick duralloy walls enclosed the cell chambers; rather than relying on energy fields as bars, I had had duralloy bars installed through which four thousand volts pulsed in an irregular, unpredictable pattern. Nobody had ever broken out of my brig. I took some little pride in this. 

            She sat curled up in a ball in the farthest corner of the cell, her face resting on her folded arms, every line of her body expressing weary resignation. I knew better than to believe it, though, and as I stepped closer to the crackling bars I caught the slight tensing of her shoulders, the almost imperceptible flexing of muscle cables that meant she was at full attention and ready to spring. 

            The dull pain in my shoulder seemed to pulse in the same irregular rhythm as the energy fields imprisoning her. It was an odd feeling; the crystal-clear, straightforward world that I had always known seemed to be cracked, flawed somehow; my course of action was no longer perfectly clear to me. I shook my head, trying to clear it, and brought the palm of my hand down flat on the energy controls. 

            The bars went dead. With another keystroke I let them retract into the ceiling, the whine of servomotors and the clang of pistons retreating into their sheaths suddenly too loud in the silence. Nightbird looked up. Her body was still taut as a bowstring, ready to leap, ready to destroy. I made no move to enter the cell; rather, I just stood there, aware of myself as I have rarely been. Aware of my physical form, in this clumsy iteration forced on me by the limitations of this world. I am a utilitarian object at best; but I am fearsome. It is on this fear that I have built my strength. Yet...

            Yet I am not sure of what I feel when I regard the Nightbird. 

            She regarded me with those tilted yellow optics, completely devoid of expression, and got to her feet in a coiled, controlled release of energy. It was the movement of a caged animal about to leap past its captor to freedom, but she held herself in check, and after a moment—as if she had to check what her voice modulator was for—she rasped "Where?"

            Presumably, "where am I." I folded my arms.   
            "You are in the Decepticon base," I said levelly. "I am Megatron, leader of the Decepticons." I refrained from adding "and you belong to me," for some reason. 

            "Cage," she rasped. Her voice was rusty with lack of use, low, without the squeaky rapid-cycle modulations I normally associate with female vocalizations. "Why?"

            "An error," I said. "My subordinates misinterpreted my intention. You are not my prisoner, Nightbird."

            "Night...bird," she repeated, as if tasting the name. "What...am I...then?" It was evident that her speech patterns were based on what she had been hearing, and it was interesting to note the improvement with each consecutive sentence. 

            I had to think about that one for a minute. "You are a Decepticon warrior," I told her. "You are one of us, now."

            I hadn't realized it, but it was what I'd intended, all along. To make her one of us. One of _mine_. 

            I held out a hand, and after a long moment she took it, black fingers against black fingers, her strength held in check, as was my own. I led her out of the brig, releasing her hand, and tried to get my self-control back: _this was not like me_, this concern, this level of thought about anything other than logistics and tactics and war. Something profound was happening to me, and despite my best efforts, it was beyond my control. 


End file.
